Then and Now: 56 and 58 Elizabeth Street
April 12, 2013 9:56 am | by Jeff Low | 1 Comment
56 and 58 Elizabeth Street. December 2, 1937. Joe's Cafe and Chop Suey. This charming cafe was on the
northwest corner of the now completely vanished Louisa and Elizabeth.
I'll go ahead and say it: as non-controversial as I like to keep my posts here; as beloved and iconic as our New
City Hall is; it sacrificed a vibrant neighbourhood of people were given no choice in the matter. The truncated
remainder of Elizabeth street Chinatown was never the same again. Imagine if half of Kensington Market were
removed...
Now. September 2012.
Now, First Floor Toronto’s
New City Hall
Source:
http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2
013/04/then-and-now-56-and58-elizabeth-street
Then and Now: Bay and Dundas from Above
April 1, 2013 11:15 am | by Jeff Low | 1 Comment
Then. Looking north from the top of the Eaton factory, circa 1910. Dundas crosses left to right/west to east
across the middle of the picture. Bay street is the north south street. The church on the northeast corner of
Dundas and Bay was a theatre (The Lyric) in its later years. It came down for the famous Ford Hotel which in
turn gave way to the present Atrium office complex.
Now. Oct. 2012.
At the left edge of both pictures can be seen a walk up apartment building (with retail on the ground floor).
It's a real survivor in this neighbourhood. It stretches from midblock between Bay and Elizabeth all the way to
Elizabeth.
Source : http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2013/04/then-and-now-bay-and-dundas-above
Then and Now: Elizabeth Street and Nathan Phillips Square
March 28, 2013 9:46 am | by Jeff Low | 2 Comments
Then. Rear 21 Elizabeth Street. May 15, 1913. The paper sign tacked upon the house says: 'UNSANITARY'.
Now. September 2012. Nathan
Philips Square.
http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2013/03/thenand-now-elizabeth-street-and-nathanphillips-square
Then and Now: Elizabeth Street
March 18, 2013 9:51 am | by Jeff Low | 1 Comment
Then. Elizabeth at Albert, looking north. September 27, 1930. That's the Registry Building on the left. Great
cars. A vanished Chinatown neighbourhood...
Now. August 2012. Nathan Philips Square in front of New City Hall.
Source: http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2013/03/then-and-now-elizabeth-street-0
Then and Now: Registry Office
March 15, 2013 11:30 am | by Jeff Low | 9 Comments
Then. May 28, 1912. 38 - 48 Elizabeth Street. 'New Registry Office Site.'
Now. September 2012. The Registry building came and went of course. Citizens of a modern Toronto gather
here at Nathan Philips Square for culture, politics and music.
Source : http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2013/03/then-and-now-registry-office
Then and Now: Elizabeth Street
March 14, 2013 9:30 am | by Jeff Low | 1 Comment
Then. February 23, 1912. 6 - 8 - 10 Elizabeth Street.
Now. August 2012.
source: http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2013/03/then-and-now-elizabeth-street
Then and Now: Hester How Public School
January 21, 2013 10:52 am | by Jeff Low | 2 Comments
Then. Hester How Public School. 1952. Elizabeth Street, west side, facing Walton Street.
Now. January 2013.
More on Hester How:
HOW, FRANCES ESTHER (Hester), educator and social reformer; b. 29 Jan. 1848 in Ireland, daughter of
Thomas Ferguson How, an accountant, and Catherine J. —; d. unmarried 22 Sept. 1915 in Toronto.
Hessie How’s family emigrated to Toronto in 1849. Following her early schooling, she graduated from the
Toronto Normal School in 1866. Employed by 1871 as a governess in a girls’ school on Jarvis Street, she was
hired on 29 Dec. 1874 as a replacement teacher by the Public School Board and assigned to York Street
School. The next year, How, who lived on Church Street with her widowed mother, transferred to George
Street School at an annual salary of $286.25; by 1881 she was teaching the junior third-book division at
Winchester Street School and earning $421.84.
In June 1881 businessman-reformer William Holmes Howland* made a proposal to the board to establish a
school in St John’s Ward to serve truant, delinquent, and homeless boys. Convinced that “the terrible rowdy
element . . . of uneducated children growing up with a perfect disregard to the law and morality . . . are
becoming a most dangerous class,” he offered to furnish a room and provide a caretaker and fuel. Publisher
William James Gage* volunteered books, stationery, and other supplies. The board, which was to appoint a
suitable teacher and manage the school, accepted the proposal, but others were sceptical. “The only hope,”
the Globe declared, “would be the slender one of finding a man of such exceptional skill and power in the
management of bad-boy nature as would enable him single-handed against a host to gain a victory.” Instead,
James Laughlin Hughes*, the inspector of public schools, chose How.
The first class was held at Grace Church on Elm Street, which Howland and others had built to serve the
poor in St John’s Ward. From the outset the experiment provided Hughes with valuable ammunition in his
tireless campaign for tighter regulation of school attendance and street trades involving youths. He reported
gleefully in 1881 that How had had immediate impact on the “roughest boys,” who were totally unaccustomed
to authority. He underlined her “kind treatment,” her rare resort to whipping, and the strength of her
personality. By April 1883, with a class of 70, her school had moved to Chestnut Street. Continuing growth in
the numbers of pupils and teachers forced relocation to College Avenue in 1889 – How became principal that
year – and to Elizabeth Street in 1892. By 1890 classes for girls and smaller children and a half-day class for
newsboys and bootblacks had been added.
Early in her career How had realized that schooling alone could not improve the lives of urchins. In the late
1880s she started a crèche. Subsequently How developed a free-lunch program, a penny bank, summer camps,
and health and dental services. Before a juvenile court was set up, she dealt with the magistrates on behalf of
her more troublesome students.
Aunt Hessie, as this gifted teacher was known to the children, was a recognized leader in the moral reform
movement. A Congregationalist, she worked in the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union (she was vicepresident of its Central Union in 1894–96), sponsored temperance lectures, and established a temperance
library in her school. At the first meeting of the Anti-Tobacco League, chaired there by Hughes on
31 May 1895, 92 of her boys pledged to abstain until age 21. Fired by evangelical zeal, How and women like
her, in organizations such as the WCTU and the Young Women’s Christian Association, also launched wider
initiatives aimed mainly at women and children, in education and moral and prison reform.
The activities of How and her school in St John’s Ward were part of a broader attempt to modify the
school system to meet the problem of impoverished children and the threat to social stability that they and
their parents were thought to pose. During her years in the Ward, its character changed drastically as
immigrants settled there, adding to its congestion and poverty [see MacariosNasr*; Francesco Glionna]. How’s
school acquired the task of teaching English to these newcomers as part of a long-term goal of assimilation.
From the turn of the century Jewish children were a particular target of Protestant missionary activities, which
frequently found a place in the precincts around Elizabeth Street School.
In 1912 the school was replaced by a new building, renamed the Hester How School. On How’s retirement
in September 1913 a portrait by John Wycliffe Lowes Forster* was unveiled there during a ceremony in which
Hughes described her as the Jane Addams of Toronto, referring to Chicago’s famed social reformer. After a
lingering illness, she died in 1915 and was buried in St James’ Cemetery.
Source : http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio.php?id_nbr=7458
SUSAN E. HOUSTON
Then and Now: Elizabeth Street South of College
September 26, 2012 11:06 am |
by Jeff Low | 3 Comments
My last Then and Now for the lost
Ward district. It's amazing what the
Toronto General Hospital did in this
area over the last hundred years,
although one may argue large
hospital facilities trump [oh dear, I
did use that word] an old decrepit
neighbourhood located in the central
downtown area.
Our own version of Chavez
Ravine [Yes, I know the
circumstances were wholly different. I'm just saying.]
Then. Elizabeth Street west side, south from College Street. 1907.
Now. May 2012.
source: http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2012/09/then-and-now-elizabeth-street-south-college
Then and Now: Hayter and Elizabeth
September 25, 2012 9:58 am | by Jeff Low | 2 Comments
Then. Hayter Street looking at the north side, east from Elizabeth Street. 1907.
Now. May 2012.
Source: http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2012/09/then-and-now-hayter-and-elizabeth
Then and Now: Hayter Street between Chestnut and Elizabeth
September 24, 2012 11:20 am | by Jeff Low | 0 Comments
Then. Hayter Street, north side, between Chestnut and Elizabeth Streets. 1907.
Now. May 2012.
Source: http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2012/09/then-and-now-hayter-street-between-chestnut-and-elizabeth
Then and Now: Elizabeth and Hayter Street
September 21, 2012 10:33 am | by Jeff Low | 0 Comments
Then. Elizabeth Street, north from Hayter Street. 1907.
Now. May 2012.
Source : http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2012/09/then-and-now-elizabeth-and-hayter-street
Then and Now: Elizabeth Street south of Dundas
August 16, 2012 10:39 am | by Jeff Low | 3 Comments
Then. Elizabeth Street. W side looking NW. just S of Dundas. c1967-ish.
Three long gone Chinatown businesses of note here:
You can just make out the 'en' of Lichee Garden on the left. They always had a Commissionaire sitting in the
entrance lobby - I always thought this classi-ed up the place.
'Mon Kuo' - if you squint you can just dimly make the name out on the awning - was one of the higher class
grocery stores; there was a travel agency in back of the store with a jawdropping mural of steam ships and
airplanes.
Kwong Chow restaurant. Still a restaurant under a different name - together with the also long gone Sai Woo
they were the powerhouse duo of Chinese eateries to be seen at. This is the last Chinese restaurant still in its
original location in the old Elizabeth Street Chinatown.
Now. May 2012
Source:
http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2012/08
/then-and-now-elizabeth-streetsouth-dundas
Then and Now: Chestnut Street
June 27, 2012 10:20 am | by Jeff Low | 2 Comments
Then. Another Old Chinatown scene. Chestnut Street, south of Dundas West, looking north. Looks to be
1964-ish, judging from the car styles. Bore mode on.
Chestnut was not the main Chinatown drag — that was Elizabeth Street's honour — but, being one block to
the west, Chestnut served as a sort of rump to Chinatown. There were some rundown stores here
interspersed with rundown mid-19th century cottage style houses — little gingerbread trimmed bungalows.
Many of the stores were run by old Chinese men — just eking out a living selling supplies to the Chinese
community at prices a little less than the Elizabeth Street businesses. Many of the customers were Chinese of
the less-well-off sort. It was here where, as a toddler, I learned my repertoire of Chinese cuss words in the
"hillbilly" dialect of Cantonese known as Toisanese.
Nowadays we just buy imported soya sauce in a bottle from the supermarket; but in the '50s and '60s (and
possibly earlier, but I wasn't around to see it) there was a thriving industry along Hwy 10 — Hurontario Street
centreed around what is now the Central Parkway intersection; where soya sauce was made by a group of —
again, old — Chinese men for local bottling and consumption. I used to help skim dead flies out of the
fermenting soy sauce, while learning Chinese from what I realize now were the lowest sort of people. :
) Hmm. Hmm.
Now. March 2012. Those old homes were cleared away in the early '70s. On the right is social housing and a
University of Toronto student residence. Bore
mode off. Good day.
source:
http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2012/06/then-andnow-chestnut-street
Then and Now: College and Elizabeth
December 15, 2011 10:52 am | by Jeff Low | 1 Comment
Then: "New West Wing of Out-Patients Department," circa 1914. This is the east side of Elizabeth, just south
of College. Perhaps this picture is mislabeled? On the left of our picture — to the north — is part of the
original Sick Childrens Hospital on Elizabeth Street. So, this wing would be to the south, not the west. Notice
all the prams parked on the sidewalk. This is another wwwebster picture.
Now. July 2011. The course of stonework on the left doesn't match up with the old picture...a bit of a head
scratcher for me.
Source : http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2011/12/then-and-now-college-and-elizabeth
Then and Now: Looking South on Chestnut
November 2, 2012 10:50 am | by Jeff Low | 0 Comments
Then. Chestnut Street looking south from Osgoode Street. March 31, 1955. A tiny picture, but if you make it
bigger on your screen you can get a sense of the "street level" that once existed in this now-windswept-mostof the-time public assembly place. There, I said it.
Now. June 2012. Nathan Philips Square.
source: http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2012/11/then-and-now-looking-south-chestnut
Then and Now: Osgoode House
October 2, 2012 10:00 am | by Jeff Low | 0 Comments
Then. Osgoode House. NE corner of Chestnut and Queen West. 1955 photograph. I don't think that anyone
mourns the loss of this old place; taken down along with the rest of this section of downtown for the New
City Hall. We have so many like it still extant - old watering holes with rooms for rent upstairs still soldiering
on - a distinctively Toronto icon: the Rex, the Dominion Hotel, Cameron House...
Now. July 2012.
source: http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2012/10/then-and-now-october-2-2012-0
Heritage Toronto Mondays:
Shea's Hippodrome
July 19, 2010 11:33 am | by Editor | 0 Comments
City of Toronto Archives, Fonds 1231, Item 840, James Salmon
collection, date 1921
SHEA’S HIPPODROME
Shea’s Hippodrome was one of the greatest vaudeville
theatres ever built in Canada. It was the brainchild of
Ontario-born Jerry and Michael Shea, famous theatre
owners and builders who moved to Buffalo New York and
gained notoriety for designing spectacular theatres. In
Toronto, prior to Shea’s Hippodrome, they built Shea’s
Yonge Street and Shea’s Victoria. The new Shea’s would
eclipse them both. Interestingly, the term Hippodrome, the
Greek word for a horse racing stadium, eventually came to
be used for large entertainment venues around the world.
Located north of Queen Street, on Terauley Street (today
Bay Street), Shea’s Hippodrome was designed by Rochester
New York firm L H. Lempert featuring a grand exterior with glass and copper domes that were illuminated at night. The
front façade was finished in a decorative white brick design topped with the words Shea’s Hippodrome that could be
seen from a distance. In the centre of the façade was a copper marquee that advertised the acts for the night. When
Shea’s Hippodrome opened in April of 1914, it became not only the largest theatre in Canada but also one of the largest
vaudeville theatres worldwide. In fact, the “Hipp” as it was known, was considered one of the big four vaudeville
theatres in North America. As such, it featured some of the world’s greatest acts including Etobicoke’s very own
O’Connor Sisters who once remarked that Shea’s Hippodrome was their favoured theatre in the country. American
actor Red Skelton who became a world famous comedian appeared at Shea’s in the mid 1930’s and once remarked “I
really got started in a big way when I went to Shea’s in Toronto.” Inside was an elaborate auditorium with seats for
some 3200 people. There were 12 grand opera boxes, an orchestra pit, decorative plaster mouldings on the ceiling and
walls, and hundreds of lights that illuminated the space. Although initially built as a vaudeville theatre, Shea’s, like many of
its contemporaries, had to adapt to rapidly developing technologies in film including sound and technicolour. In addition
to musical acts, theatre, acting, song and dance, Shea’s featured films such as The Ten Commandments. Shea’s
Hippodrome was demolished in the late 1950’s to make way for the development of New City Hall. Sources Palaces of
the Night, Canada’s Grand Theatres by John Lindsay The development and nature of vaudeville in Toronto: from 1899
to 1915 by Gerald Lenton
Source: http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2010/07/heritage-toronto-mondays-sheas-hippodrome